Re-invent (are you really needed?)

A few years ago The President of a large American bank, well before e-banking existed said ‘Banking is needed, banks are not’. This was a precious piece of management wisdom. When applied to organisations it would be worth remembering that most of the functions inside (read big/not so big departments and their VPs/Directors/managers) are not needed at all. Their functionalities may be. Quality is needed but a Division of Quality is not. Regulatory and government affairs are needed but a Department with that name is not. The same goes for Customer Services, Product Development, Market Research and Marketing etc. Even Sales! Selling is needed, a sales department is not. If most people thought of that first thing in the morning we could create an epidemic of anti navel-glazing. I gave a presentation to a 250 people pharmaceutical industry a few days ago under the title of ‘Re-invent’ which I’d share with you here (taking away lots of copyrighted pretty pictures...) Towards the end I also point to the fact that we do not have good management toolkits anymore, having been old and taught on ‘Best practice management’ which are completely inappropriate for today’s world.
See the presentation here